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Recalling ’95 Bombing, Clinton Sees Parallels

WASHINGTON — With the 15th anniversary of the Oklahoma City bombing approaching, former President Bill Clinton on Thursday drew parallels between the antigovernment tone that preceded that devastating attack and the political tumult of today, saying government critics must be mindful that angry words can stir violent actions.

In advance of a symposium on Friday about the attack on the Oklahoma City federal building and its current relevance, Mr. Clinton, who was in his first term at the time of the bombing, warned that attempts to incite opposition by demonizing the government can provoke responses beyond what political figures intend.

“There can be real consequences when what you say animates people who do things you would never do,” Mr. Clinton said in an interview, saying that Timothy McVeigh, who carried out the Oklahoma City bombing, and those who assisted him, “were profoundly alienated, disconnected people who bought into this militant antigovernment line.”

The former president said the potential for stirring a violent response might be even greater now with the reach of the Internet and other common ways of communication that did not exist on April 19, 1995, when the building was struck.

“Because of the Internet, there is this vast echo chamber and our advocacy reaches into corners that never would have been possible before,” said Mr. Clinton, who said political messages are now able to reach those who are both “serious and seriously disturbed.” He will be delivering the keynote address Friday at an event about the Oklahoma City attack being sponsored by the Center for American Progress Action Fund and the Democratic Leadership Council.

Mr. Clinton pointed to remarks like those made Thursday by Representative Michele Bachmann, the Minnesota Republican, who when speaking at a Tea Party rally in Washington characterized the Obama administration and Democratic Congress as “the gangster government.”

“They are not gangsters,” Mr. Clinton said. “They were elected. They are not doing anything they were not elected to do.”

The pitched attacks by some Republicans and conservatives during the health care fight have drawn criticism as incendiary as have the use of terms and imagery like the placing of target cross hairs over the districts of vulnerable Democrats who backed health care.

Over the weekend of the health care vote, Congressional Democrats reported being subjected to racial and sexual slurs as they walked to the Capitol to vote. Recently, at least three people have been arrested on charges of making threats of violence against members of Congress of both parties, and Congressional offices have been vandalized.

In response to the criticism, several conservative leaders say reports of threats, intimidation and violence are being overblown or were not true and were instead part of an effort to vilify and silence critics of the Democratic Congress and Obama administration.

Photo

Gloria Taylor at the site for victims of the Oklahoma City bombing, which killed 168 people on April 19, 1995.Credit
Paul Buck/European Pressphoto Agency

In her remarks Thursday, Ms. Bachmann made light of the suggestion that antigovernment activists were angry.

“You look happy to me, you don’t look angry,” she told the crowd. “That’s because you get it. You are smart enough to get off your couch and do something.”

Mr. Clinton said his intent was not to stifle debate or muzzle critics of the government but to encourage them to consider what repercussions could follow. He acknowledged that drawing the line between acceptable discourse and that which goes too far is difficult but that lawmakers and other officials should try.

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“Have at it,” he said. “You can attack the politics. Criticize their policies. Don’t demonize them, and don’t say things that will encourage violent opposition.”

In the period before the Oklahoma City bombing, there was a growing antigovernment sentiment being expressed through a militia movement and anger at government officials, some of it in the wake of the assault on the Branch Davidian Compound in Waco, Tex., on April 19, 1993. Mr. Clinton recalls that he and his wife, Hillary Rodham Clinton, were characterized by Newt Gingrich, then the Republican Congressional leader, as the enemies of ordinary Americans.

In a May 1995 commencement speech at Michigan State University, Mr. Clinton talked about the bombing and the role he believed efforts to portray the government and its workers as a threat played in the attack.

“It is one thing to believe we are over-regulated and to work to lessen the burden of regulation,” he said at the time. “It is quite another to slander our dedicated public servants, our brave police officers, even our rescue workers, who have been called a hostile army of occupation.”

After the bombing, Mr. Clinton said he chose to no longer even use the term federal bureaucrat because he believed it had become a term used to demean and dehumanize federal workers.

Mr. Clinton said the impact of political attacks could be dangerously amplified at the moment because of the economic upheaval that had left many Americans frightened and suffering. “A lot of people are just raw,” he said.

He called America a nation born out of protests, and said that he had no interest in reducing productive civic dialogue.

“This is about holding our country together and having these debates,” he said. “The Republicans will have their chance in November.”

Kate Zernike contributed reporting.

A version of this article appears in print on April 16, 2010, on Page A16 of the New York edition with the headline: Recalling ’95 Bombing, Clinton Sees Parallels. Order Reprints|Today's Paper|Subscribe